The Coast Way

By Sanne

Before we leave Brazil and before I forget I need to get this off my chest: “WHAT IS THE DEAL WITH ALL THE SPEED HUMPS!??” Seriously, it’s insane the amount of speed humps in this country. They pop up everywhere, highway, or small streets, much to the annoyance of yours truly. Maybe they should invest in some more police on the roads instead if it’s speed they want to control, because I don’t know what the police in Brazil spends their days doing but it sure as hell ain't spent patrolling the roads. The few police I have driven past didn’t look twice at people who were driving too fast – myself included! We have been told the Brazilian police are amongst the most corrupt in the world, so I guess if there’s no money in it for them, they turn a blind eye.

Moan aside, we left Rio to head south and returned to the lovely beach village of Trindade on the Costa Verde. Here we once again ran into Jonas, the 50-something year old dude who have lived in his tent at the campground for no less than 3 years… We suspect he’s the local drug dealer. Nice guy though.

After that we spent a night in Caraguatatuba where we stayed before. It’s some holiday apartment being renovated and since they’re owned by a Brazil Rider we were invited to stay there.

The next day we made our way to Peruibe, a coastal town with not much interesting to mention. The skies had opened and it was raining buckets. We stopped to get fuel at a petrol station and as I was riding out I rode over an oil spill and with barely any acceleration my bike did a 180 and I ended up on the ground.

Our next hosts were Isa and Zequina from Curitiba (also Brazil Riders) but we visited them in their holiday home in the beach town of Pontal do Parana. They were both really lovely and we managed to communicate with not too many problems, and this was when I realised that when Mark is trying to speak Portuguese he sounds exactly like stuttering Jim Trott from Vicar of Dibley! This is not meant to be a payout on him, believe me I’m not doing much better! I think we have by now both resigned ourselves to the fact that the Portuguese language is just never going to be part of our vocabulary. Thank god, it’s only Spanish from here on in for the rest of the trip.

With Isa and Zequina we went on a daytrip to Ilha do Mel (Island of Honey). Why it’s called that, I’m not exactly sure as there’s no honey on it as far as I’m aware. It’s a beautiful little island that’s barely been developed, there are no roads, just sandy paths and no vehicles are allowed on the island. It is very pristine and picturesque and the majority of the island is an ecological reserve which is closed off to the public. There are a few surfers around, some people hiking, it’s very “tranquilo” to use a Portuguese term.

When we left Isa and Zequina (who by the way nicknamed me ‘rabbit’ presumably because I like to eat lettuce a lot) we managed to make our second person cry. Poor Isa had tears running down her face when we said our goodbyes… I don’t like to see people cry because of us, but if it’s a sign they have enjoyed our company, we can only feel incredibly blessed to have met such lovely people.  

Next stop was Blumenau, which was founded by German Immigrants and is known for its many breweries and has the biggest Oktober Fest outside of Germany, which unfortunately we missed. Here we stayed in the home of another Brazil Rider, Venturini and his wife Lily. They were incredibly nice to us, however I don’t think they quite understood the concept of Vegetarianism. They made us lunch and in the bean soup which they claimed was vegetarian were chunks of meat floating... “But it’s only small pieces!” they exclaimed. We skipped the beans and had rice instead.

While in Blumenau we also met James and Jonas, two local brothers who have traveled around South America on their XT 660’s and they invited us to their house to meet their family and exchange stories from the road. Like many of the people we meet it is their dream to do a big trip like ours but for many it is a difficult dream to realise. You need not only money, but also the time and the ability to let go of any commitments you might have. If you have a family and kids and a mortgage on top, well it’s just not that easy. In that sense Mark and I are fortunate because everything we own is on the bikes! James and Jonas are really top guys and we were lucky to meet them completely by coincidence by James spotting our bikes in the street. We hope to see them again on the road someday, somewhere. And Jonas, all the best for your speedy recovery mate, you have been through a lot. Positive thoughts go out to you and your family.

Then it was on to Florianopolis, and yes, you guessed it: another Brazil Rider! This time Edson who himself have done a bit of traveling in South America on his bike. Our arrival was celebrated with a party thrown for us attended by the local motorbike club. Seriously, our egos are growing bigger by the day! What are we gonna do when we return from this trip and no one treats us like celebrities anymore?! I don’t even want to think that thought! Pizzas and beers were in abundance and we greedily tucked in. Everyone was so nice (as is the case with everyone in Brazil, seriously Brazilians have got to be the friendliest and warmest people we have encountered on our entire trip) although I wouldn’t mind if I never again get to hear the sentence: “What??? You ride your own bike??!” followed by a look of utter disbelief and shock! Because as progressive as Brazil might be, women riding their own motorbikes just still seems too out of this world for them. It is a little disappointing to have met so many bike riders and literally none of them have been female. The women are present at all the events and even on the trips they do, but always as the passenger. Come on ladies of Brazil! Get off that pillion seat and get your own bike. Let’s see some girl power here!

This was around the time my camera started playing up. It is now 4 or 5 years old and we have been using it every single day now for 2 ½ years. It has seen sand, dust, rain, snow, been exposed to soaring heat and freezing cold and being tossed around on bumpy roads. And now is the first time we have had any problems with it. Well, as it turned out it wasn’t actually the camera that was faulty but the lens. We took it to a camera repair place and this Japanese dude took it apart and found that the reason we are having problems is that the shutter gets stuck because of a faulty flat cable diaphragm. Unfortunately he told us he couldn’t fix it, that we had it to take it to an Olympus Service Centre to get the part replaced. So now we have to wait till we get to Montevideo which is where the closest one is. I just hope that 1. They can fix it 2. It won’t cost a fortune and 3. Our camera won’t sh*t itself completely on the way there, as for now it still works intermittently.

The next night Edson took us to a Triumph store opening. I don’t know what I expected, but had it been a motorbike store opening anywhere in Australia it would have gone off with a lot less pomp. You would have had a ‘barbie’ going on in the carpark on a Saturday afternoon and people would have shown up in their double pluggers and wife beaters to have a scurry around or at least to get a free feed.
When a motorbike store opens in Brazil on the other hand, it’s more like a movie premiere in comparison. First off all there was a queue to get in, when we got to the end of the queue we were greeted by scary looking doormen (do doormen always have to look so damn angry??) and glamorous girls who checked us off the guest list much like a private members club. We then proceeded to walk up the red carpet which lead us inside where we were greeted by more girls wearing skintight leotards posing with the bikes. The next thing we knew a posh-looking waiter presented us with a glass of champagne each and for the remainder of the night that glass never went empty thanks to the ever-attentive waiter. Wonder how that fits in with Brazil's no tolerance policy to drink driving. The limit here is 0.0% and if you get caught it means a night in prison and a hefty fine. Everyone had come on their bikes that night and everyone drank. Lucky the police are so lazy here or they would have had a field trip that night. 

Another thing that surprised me was that here people could get on the showroom bikes, turn them on and rev the living daylight out of them. Almost like a burnout. It is very popular to do that here in Brazil. At every single bike event we have been to (and just generally on the street), there is always some knobhead reving his bike so loud that you think your eardrums are going to explode. They don’t seem to realise/care that they’re actually destroying their bike by doing so. I have now resorted to waving my pinky finger at the offender every time I see someone do this. But from the reactions I get I don’t think they understand what the ‘pinky wave’ means and I realised that maybe it’s just in Australia we do this. It is basically a way to show the driver/motorcyclist that they have a penis roughly the size of a pinky finger and are trying to make up for it by either going fast or doing ridiculous stunts. Anyway, after one day waving my finger right in a guy’s face and he just smiled and started talking to me, I think the joke is lost on them. I’ll keep on doing it though. I know what it means.

After leaving Edson we spent a few days on Ilha Santa Catarina which is gorgeous but way, way, way too overdeveloped. We were there midweek and it was still full of people. I would hate to be there during the holidays. It has some stunning beaches as well as lakes and mountains AND the tastiest Acai we have had to date! I am sorry I keep on ranting about this damn Acai but I cannot get enough. The three days we were there we each had an Acai every day. The excuse being that this was going to be our last chance to eat it as further south of here they don’t sell it.

After trying our hand at paddle boarding in Rio and mainly succeeding in falling off a lot we wanted to give it another go. At least here we could do it on a calm lake with no waves which made it a hell of a lot easier. It was actually really enjoyable paddling around the lake while fish were jumping out of the water all around us. We were lucky to find our very first bush camp in South America down a dirt track which lead through a pine forest all the way to our own little beach. Here we camped undisturbed for two nights and man, it felt good to be back in nature again. I am forever thankful to all the people who have hosted us in their homes here in Brazil, but nothing compares to camping in the wild with no people around, just Mark and I and nature. It doesn’t get much better than that.

A return to lovely Trindade...

Sliding rock

This is your beach Felix!

And lovely it is, we wish we could have camped there

The caretaker of the holiday apartments in Caraguatatuba

Drying out the tent (and everything else) after a wet night...Wonder how we'll cope in Patagonia...

Dead penguin on Ilha do Mel

Cave

Our hike around the island took us on an unexpected route!

Isa, Zequina and Mark

Dead turtle (does everything wash up and die here??)

Beautiful beaches

Paths like these traverse the island

I'll try to control my euphoria but I can't make any guarantees...

Giving the babies a much needed hose down

Saying goodbye to Isa and Zequina

Barge from Matinhos-Guaratuba

Yes, this is really Brazil! Blumenau's Oktober Fest area

Can't believe they roped me into this...in character as a German Hausfrau

James, Jonas and their family

Venturini and me

Brazil Riders party in Florianopolis

We are now proud owners of Brazil Riders t-shirts

Ilha de Santa Catarina

Our bush camp

Oh Acai, how I love thee!

Paddle boarding

I had to include this one; notice the by-chance caught moment when Mark drools beer out of his mouth 

and it lands on my arm. Classy as always. 

Rio de Janeiro

By Sanne

We made our way to Recreio dos Bandeirantes, the suburb of Rio where we were going to stay with our Couchsurfing host, Nicolas. We found it without any problems and decided to hang out on the beach while we were waiting for Nicolas to come home from work.
That first night Nicolas took us to a reggae gig in the neighborhood of Lapa. It was like a Dutch oven in there, but what is a reggae gig without mary jane right? Reggae is usually not my choice of music (especially when it's in Portuguese, a language of which I understand nada) but because we were in such good company with Nicolas and his friends it made for an enjoyable night nevertheless.

We spent the weekend with Nicolas and he took us to the local beaches around that area which were great but there was quite a big a swell when we were there and it made swimming quite an ordeal with strong rips present. Still it was nice to be in the water again and the beaches were beautiful. Mark's sole attention was on the scantily clad ladies on the beach. I now understand why the Brazilian was invented here. 99.9% of women here wear a g-string bikini. Apparently being topless is not allowed in Rio so everyone resorts to flashing their bum cheeks instead. Including the ones who really shouldn't have.

Bumcheeks aside, Nicolas introduced us to the delicacy that is: Acai icecream.  We had tasted Acai juice before and weren't impressed but the icecream version is much better. Acai is a berry from the Amazon and is one of those fruits that are being touted as a "Superfood" because it's super high in energy and antioxidants. We had it with granola on top and the very first bite...ahh we weren't too sure but then the flavour just grows and grows on you until you're like: Goddamn this is good! From that moment on we had one every day while we were in Rio.

After the weekend we left the bikes parked safely at Nicolas' condo and caught a bus into Ipanema. Here we had booked ourselves into a hostel for a few nights so we could be closer to all the attractions. This was to be only the third time on this entire trip we had stayed in a hostel as we try to avoid those places like the plague. On top of that Mark had never slept in a dorm room before so it was a bit of a change of scenery for us both. Like the grandma and grandpa we are we had even bought earplugs especially for this occasion. But...we needn't have worried. People here were actually really nice and definitely not your stereotypical backpacker douchebag. We even managed to make some friends there. It was obvious though that the travelers here are very different to overlanders. Not that that is a bad thing, but it was just very funny to see people's reactions when we told them about our trip. They clearly hadn't expected that! One sweet Korean girl even exclaimed: "Wow, you are REAL travelers!"

The waves at Ipanema were big and the water too treacherous for swimming unfortunately, Copacabana was the same with the exception of the southernmost corner which was swimable so we hired a paddleboard for an hour as neither of us had ever tried that before. Verdict: it's frickin' hard! It didn't help of course that the ocean wasn't that calm. Suffice to say, we both took many comic tumbles off the board, trying to get our balance and my ever-deteriorating dead toenail (which has been with me since some lardarse stepped on my toe at the Erzberg after party in April) almost managed to crack completely off but the sly f*cker is still hanging on for dear life so I have to resort to covering it with bandaids as to not put people off their food. It's gross. Anyway...

After the beach we caught the cable car to Pao de Acucar or Sugarloaf Mountain, the iconic peak which rises from the waters of Guanabara Bay in Rio. From the top you can see all over Rio; you see Christ the Redeemer statue straight across on another mountain, you see Favelas spread out on the mountainsides, the bustling city centre and to the east you see long, curvy Copacabana beach. We had been told it was the best view in Rio and I agree. Unfortunately it wasn't the clearest of days but we are slowly getting used to the fact that the weather pattern in Latin America is one of the strangest we have ever encountered. The weather is so up and down and the forecasts so wrong most of the time that we don't even check them anymore.
We stayed up on Sugarloaf until the sun went down and city lights below lit up all while the cold wind was blowing and giving us goosebumps (we were 396 m high).

The next day we paid a visit to Jesus himself. Christ the Redeemer or Cristo Redentor in Portuguese is not just a "Pylon" to quote Karl Pilkington. It is considered the biggest Art Deco statue in the world standing 30 m tall and arms stretched 28 m wide. The statue has become an icon for Rio de Janeiro and Brazil so of course we couldn't leave Rio without seeing it up close. As with Sugarloaf the sky was pretty hazy so we didn't get the best view over Rio but it was still enjoyable.

On our last night in Rio we went to a local samba school to watch them practice for the Rio Carnival in February. There a many schools but the one we went to, Vila Isabel, won the parade last year. A bunch of us from the hostel went and it was a really fun night with lots of music and samba dancing. The schools start practicing about 6 months before the Carnival in huge square compounds which are usually in bad neighborhoods and most if not all of the people in the school are from Favelas. I loved it. The drumming was super fast and loud and the dancers the same. Those girls can shake their asses! Just ask all the boys as they all casually moved to where the girls were dancing. There were guys dancing too though...one particular specimen was...shall we say...screaming homosexual. I mean, this guy was 1,000 times more feminine than all the girls together. He was an incredibly good dancer though and very entertaining to watch. Pezao, I think this guy kisses dudes for sure!

There is so much more to Rio than what we saw but it surprised me that it was such a pleasant city to be in and also that it felt pretty safe. It is definitely one of the most stunning big cities I have ever been to. And who knows, maybe one day we'll return...

A little monkey outside Nicolas' home - I gave it my banana

 Mark, Nicolas and me at the beach close to his home

One of the most delicious foods of Brazil: Acai. Yum!

Ipanema!

Pao de Acucar - Mount Sugarloaf

On top of Sugarloaf with a view of Christ the Redeemer in the distance

A baby monkey clinging to its mother's back

Rio seen from Sugarloaf

Rio by night

The long curved stretch of beach in the left of the photo is Copacabana

 Beautiful Macaw or Arara as the call it here (because that's the sound it makes!) just chillin in the park

We hired some bikes and rode along the beaches, here Ipanema

Surf's up

Copacabana

Christ the Redeemer's little brother rising from the sand on Copacabana beach

As well as four lovely ladies...

Lagoa Rodrigo de Freitas

Vidigal Favela

Probably the favela sitting on the most prime real estate in Rio, right next to Leblon beach

Christ the Redeemer

Overlooking Rio from the Christ

Doing my best Jesus impression

At the samba school; this guy kisses dudes

Girls shaking their thang'

Boys too

This dude reminded me of Lou Bega and Mambo no. 5, either way he clearly thought he was the shit

The Road to Rio

By Mark

After leaving the Pantanal we were very happy to know that we had another Brazil Rider ready to take us in in a small town called Aquiduana. Valtemir was our host along with his wife Vera. Their small home town is by no means a tourist town but we really enjoy coming to these small towns and have the locals show us around. Valtermir was great, taking us out kayaking and showing us around town, and when we would return home Vera would have a fantastic meal there waiting for us. The best was her Risotto, oh my god! It was good, it was so sweet of her to cater to our vego needs. We had only a short stay with these guys but we were made to feel very welcome the whole time. Valtermir helped me get my bike sorted out after the problem I had in the Pantanal. I have been carrying a lot of weight on the bike for a while now, maybe too much and with this and including the bad roads and the bike having to put up with this for so long the pannier rails could not handle it anymore and snapped clean off in two different places. Luckily Valtemir's mate who lived across the road was there to help and had the frame welded back together again in no time. Was not too keen on his idea of straightening the frame. When I tried attaching it back to the bike again the bolt holes did not quite line up, one would usually heat the metal and bend it, but not this big guy. He pulled out his big arse hammer and started belting the life out of it. I was not too happy about it but it did work. While here, we were interviewed (again!) for a local rag. Oh the life of being a celebrity...

Our next stop was Campo Grande, and another stay with a Brazil rider. We were escorted all the way by Valtermir and Vera, it was a sad fairwell as Vera started to weep as we said our goodbyes. It is hard to believe the connection we make with such open people as we travel. For us it is all we know now, moving on to strangers' homes day after day interacting with all sorts of people all the time and we tend to forget what it must be like for the people we leave behind. We are also strangers coming into these peoples homes going about our lives and in a flash we are gone. We have had so many sweet things said by the people we have stayed with and do not realise how it must be for the people we leave behind. We are very lucky for our life and feel blessed to have the chance to meet such great and hospitable people.

Our ride east was one with nothing too much to note, but for the first time on our trip we did find that someone, a particular host or his family members found themselves with sticky fingers and left us short of $250! We did not realise this until we were 180km's down the road and we were really pissed that someone would take such advantage of us and leave us with an empty wallet. It did put a bit of a dampener on things but we could not let this stop us from keeping on taking the opportunity to meet and stay with locals. It has just made us a little more wary and now we keep a closer eye on all our possessions.

We had another stop with more great hosts and the next in line was Saimon and Vanessa from Piracacaba. Well, we really landed on our feet here. They have a beautiful house on the edge of town with an awesome outdoor kitchen along with a guest house out the back with ensuite and cable tv which Sanne put to good use! Again our hosts went to great lengths to make us feel welcome, our first night they had friends from Brazil Riders come over for dinner and meet us. The whole time we were here we were treated to some great food, company and all round good hospitality with Saimon even helping out driving all over the city to find a plastic welder as Sanne’s petrol tank had somehow sprung a leak. A crack had appeared in the strangest of places and I am still baffled at how this came about but with the help of Saimon we found a place where it could get fixed and the guy did a good job at repairing it. I just hope that it holds. This time we were lucky and in a place where we could fix the problem easy, I hope it doesn’t happen again especially in the middle of Patagonia!

While we were in Piracababa we also attended another school, this time a private school where Saimon and Vanessa’a kids go to school. It was a fun morning and the kids where right into it, not sure about their journalistic skills though, one of the first questions asked was: Do you like Justin Bieber? WTF! Bad questions aside it was a good morning. At the end we both found ourselves writing autographs on half the classes arms.

We took off for a weekend to meet up with a bunch of fellow Brazil riders in Itapeva. About 250kms away. It was a great weekend for a ride but not so much of the nice flowing roads that we would really like to be on, or dirt for that matter. I did get to have a good little ride on Saimon’s BMW F800GS. Sanne is going to shoot me for saying this but I really enjoyed riding the bike and could see myself owning one in the future, I may be single then as Sanne loves her little Suzy and any talk of ever getting a BMW is met with rolling eyes and the disbelief that I would be so quick to pass on my little Suzuki. Saturday was met with many beers at the pub meeting many new people and some hosts we will be staying with further down the road. It was a good day but turned out to be very hot so had to watch how much I drank, the other thing is that we still needed to find a campground. When it came time to do so the sun was gone and we had scored a place to sleep the night, no tent required. Oh the life of having contacts.

After our weekend away we hit the road first thing Monday morning to make our way for the coast. I could hear the beach calling me and I could not wait to smell that sea air again. We came into our first real heavy traffic since being in Brazil around Sao Paulo and it was heavy and fast and as usual I had my little moment but soon got over it after a quick break to check we were still going in the right direction. It was mostly a boring ride until we got close to the coast and you could start to see the start of the mountains that we would be crossing. Half way up we encountered a massive traffic jam that went for many kilometres, so we ducked and swerved all the way until we got to the front. No sign of any vehicles going in either direction, great! Ah, but we have bikes. We have got this far, we can go further. It just happened that we were right next to a small lane that leads off down into a village, up over a hill and spits you back out at the end of the road works, sweet. Got to love being on the bikes in those sorts of situations. Within no time we are at the top of the mountain and find ourselves twisting and turning down the mountain and then we see a view I had been longing to see for quite a while, the Atlantic ocean spread out in front of us. By the time we had got down to the coastline the beach wasn’t looking as promising as up on the mountain but the salt air smelt great. We stayed in the city here, Caraguatatuba for 2 nights, again through the help of Brazil riders. That night was interesting as there was a huge storm and it belted down with rain and we found our room flooding with a torrent of water coming in under the door and filling up quickly. Thankfully it subsided after a while and we could tidy up. We managed to have time to get some small jobs sorted out and planned a route for our trip to Rio De Janeiro. 

We had a few days up our sleeve as we had a couch surfing host lined up to take us in for our first few days there. Our first stop was going to be Paraty, but we had read about a place called Trindade so we left the highway which was after a stunning 130km stretch of road which they call Costa Verde (Green Coast). We found ourselves climbing up another steep mountain side before dropping down an even steeper road on the other side until we came across a beautiful bay and a small village. We arrived early and straight away I suggested that we stay the night so we did. It was great to be camped right by the beach. There is nothing better than lying in bed listening to the waves as you drift off to sleep. This is where we met Jonas, a really nice guy who we got chatting to as we were cooking dinner that night. In our poor Portuguese we learnt that he had been living in his tent here for 3 years. I can see why as it is a beautiful piece of coastline, but I did find it a little odd.

We decided that we should move on and the next day we had our shortest days ride to date, 29km! Paraty is meant to be this charming little colonial village. Well, the buildings are beautiful, the cobbled streets are hellish to ride on and the food is overpriced but we did decide to camp there all the same. I wish we hadn’t as it turned out to be a very noisy night with stuff going on everywhere, motorbikes hooning up the road at all hours and just when we thought it had gone quiet, the dogs in the entire neighbourhood thought it was their turn to make some noise. Not a good sleep and then we were lucky to awake to grey skies with lots of rain sitting and waiting for us.

Within minutes of leaving town the sky opened up on us and we thought we would just ride on through it. I am sure the sun is meant to come out later I said, well it didn’t. Well, not until we were entirely drenched first since we had not put our wet weather gear on in the morning. Who cares, we had a bad night, a wet ride but we were finally headed for Rio Baby!

Valtemir on the right and sadly I have forgotten the name of the guy on the left, 

I do know he is the oldest member of Brazil Riders and still enjoys riding solo

Sanne enjoying a paddle on the river

Our great hosts, Vera and Valtemir

The one time we didn't get hosted or find a camp spot, a hotel was the only option

We found there was too many of these for our liking, especially when they are every 30 to 50km's

Me, Saimon, his daughter and Mr McGoo, Piracababa

Enjoying a meal with Saimon and Vanessa (in the middle) and with friends and family

Piracababa skyline

Our free accommodation in Caraguatatuba

Busy mopping up the flood in our room

Sanne enjoying a bit of sunshine in Trindade

Me enjoying some of the local fauna

Our nice little campspot by the beach in Trindade

The cobbled streets of Paraty

This little hook is used to save us from being strangled by kids and adults with kites! In Rio and Sao Paulo state many people use glass powder on their kite lines to cut each others lines and take down their kites. Also known for taking out the occasional motorcyclist!